


Crankshaft

by Ajaxthegreat



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Biker Levi, Dive bar fighting, Excessive Innuendo, Explicit Sexual Content, Extremely Inappropriate Use of a Motorcycle, Graphic Violence, M/M, Mechanic Erwin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-09
Updated: 2018-10-18
Packaged: 2019-03-29 02:36:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13917585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ajaxthegreat/pseuds/Ajaxthegreat
Summary: “I’m very careful,” Erwin says, voice low. He eases several parts of the engine free and places the damaged crankcase on the ground once he isolates it, along with the crankshaft and the oil pump. His hand lingers horribly in the V of the engines. “It’s all about the right pressure, you know.”In which Erwin the dirty mechanic might be hiding a secret, Levi is far too protective of his bike, Isabel is a maniacal little shit, and Farlan is too tired for this.





	1. It's uh just like riding a.... bike

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LostCauses (Anteros)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anteros/gifts).



> I BLAME LOSTCAUSES FOR EVERYTHING.  
> This came from this art from YEARS ago by stereowire: [[http://stereowire.tumblr.com/post/63899528045/when-i-get-bored-at-work-i-start-thinking-about]] which haunted my dreams and destroyed my life forever.
> 
>  
> 
> ps, this is terrible sex etiquette. be safe kids.

Levi’s outside with Farlan smoking a cigarette when the back of his neck tingles.

He gets up abruptly, hands the second half of his cigarette to Farlan who takes it without comment, and stamps his feet.

“Bad feeling?” Farlan asks, smoking Levi’s cigarette as his own burns out. Levi nods.

“Want backup?”

Levi peers through the door: dark, dingy, with several pool tables and the owners of the 40 or so Harley’s parked outside getting very drunk at the bar.

Levi shakes his head, cracking his knuckles. “It’s alright,” he says, then nods to the bikes. There are several predictably racist bumper stickers and a dizzying amount of American flag painted gas tanks. One of the bikes has flames on it. “They’re Harleys. I got it.”

Farlan laughs, nods and salutes him. Levi heads inside.

The wall of smoke and stale beer smell that hits him has his eyes watering almost immediately, and that’s before the shitty 80s hair metal. A few huge, potbellied white guys give him dirty looks as he shoulders his way through the crowd – _fuck, these people smell horrible –_ and Levi has to remember to breathe. They’ve only been in town for two days. It’s best not to start a fight unless he has to.

Isabel is predictably stirring up shit at the bar.

Some giant piece of shit has got her backed up against the bartop, trying to stick his hands up her shirt and slurring something about being his _old lady_. Levi watches sedately as she twists his hand backwards until his wrist breaks.

By the time Levi gets there the giant is going for her hair, and Levi grabs him by the shoulder and spins him around.

“Hey.”

The giant stinks of whiskey and a horrifying amount of body odor, and he squints down at Levi like he can’t see him. Levi rolls his eyes.

“The lady asked you nicely to leave her alone.”

Isabel rolls her eyes and says, “Levi, I got it, it’s – ”

“Shut up, Dizzy.”

The giant looks Levi over with dull, bloodshot eyes and says, “She yours?”

Isabel and Levi speak at the exact same time, “She ain’t anybody’s.”

They’re attracting a crowd now, the look in Levi’s eyes and the way he’s standing unmistakably violent. The giant has a few friends behind him and it makes him brave and rude.

He spits on the ground and says, “I was wondering whose foreign-ass bikes were out there.”

He reaches forward toward Levi as if to shove him, moving so slowly it’s almost comical. Levi sidesteps with a roll of his eyes and hits him in the ear for good measure.

When Levi speaks, his voice is so low it barely carries over the music.

“Don’t touch me with your filthy hand.”

The giant grunts, cracks his neck, and a scraggly white guy behind him says, “Kick his ass, Duke.”

Levi looks over at Isabel to see her stifling a laugh and mouthing _Duke?_ at him. She gestures to the giant with her chin and reaches behind her for a beer bottle, gripping it by the neck. She’s already got a whiskey in her other hand.

Levi sighs. So it’s going to be that sort of night.

Several things then happen in very quick succession: the jukebox shuts off to reveal Farlan fiddling with it, switching the soundtrack, the giant called Duke shrugs off his horrifying denim Eagle-embroidered vest, and Isabel smashes her glass of whiskey on the ground and screams, “Fight!”

Farlan’s choice suddenly blares through the bar: _Dizzy Miss Lizzy_ by Larry Williams. He turns it up and Levi distantly hears him say, “This one’s for you, Diz,” before someone throws a punch at him.

Isabel laughs and Levi nails Duke the Giant with a right hook to the liver. Absolute mayhem follows.

Duke’s wrist is already broken - courtesy of Isabel - so he tries to swing at Levi with his other hand and misses by a mile. His miss is so ridiculous, in fact, that Levi doesn’t even need to dodge, and Isabel laughs so loudly Duke turns to face her again.

This time, Levi leaves her to it: he’s got other goons to deal with.

Two of them go for him at once, nearly twice his height and so slow Levi starts to wonder if this is some sort of dream. He ducks, lands an elbow to the ribs of the one on his right with a sickening crack, spins and knees the one on his left straight in the solar plexus.

Isabel hits Duke over the head with the beer bottle from earlier and it doesn’t break. Duke grabs his head and Isabel shrugs, turns to Levi.

“That always works in movies.”

Before Levi can respond she’s lifting herself up on the bar and dropkicking Duke halfway across the room, ass over head.

“Nice,” Levi says, thinks _just like I taught you_ , and crouches to throw someone over his shoulder.

Isabel drops another guy who tries to grab her hair and Levi holds out a fist. She bumps it briefly, grinning.

“Where’s our Church mouse?” she asks, looking over heads for Farlan.

The entire room has exploded into utter pandemonium. Two people wrestling on a table break one of the legs and the snap of it resounds sharply through the bar, but it barely even turns heads. Someone is wielding a pool cue like a fighting staff -

“Over there,” Levi says to Isabel, pointing. “With the pool cue.”

Farlan hits a man across the face with the pool cue so hard that _teeth_ leave his mouth and land on the pool table like tossed dice. Farlan grins.

Isabel whoops and throws him two thumbs up and someone actually throws a _knife_ at her and she’s not looking -

Levi catches it by the blade and curses, glares at the two of them and barks, “Pay _attention_ ,” as he throws the knife and embeds it tip-first in the dart board.

“Sorry, Bro,” Isabel says, not looking apologetic in the least. “Bullseye, though.”

Levi rolls his eyes.

Somehow the fight devolves into the sort of disgusting brawl that’s mostly inept rolling on the ground, and Levi finds himself back-to-back with Farlan while Isabel stands on the bar top, cackling and kicking anyone who gets too close square in the face.

“We’re supposed to be keeping a low profile,” Levi hisses over his shoulder at Farlan, who decks a massive bearded monstrosity with his pool cue so hard the man’s knocked out cold. “We just robbed a goddamn bank.”

Farlan shrugs in response. “We’re new. We’re breaking the city in.”

“We’re breaking the city,” Levi corrects, glancing out the window. “We should get out of -”

His bike, his _bike_ , is on the ground. On its side, like a kicked puppy. Probably scratched all to hell, possibly even legitimately damaged -

All thoughts of low profiles and leaving flee Levi’s head and he takes the pool cue from Farlan’s hands and snaps it in half over his knee.

He gets up on the bar and stands there shaking with rage, with one half of the pool cue in each hand, then speaks with such abject fury that the whole room turns to look.

“Who the _fuck_ ,” Levi says to the now quiet room, voice soft, “touched my _fucking_ bike?”

No one responds. Isabel peers out the door, sees the motorcycle lying on its side and hisses.

“Yall,” she says, as if the crowd is a group of rowdy children who’ve should know better. She raises her eyebrows at Farlan, who’s still giving Levi a look for taking the pool cue out of his hands.

Someone very near the bar Levi is standing on says in a drunk, loud voice, “Who cares about your stupid ugly – ”

Levi doesn’t even hesitate: he sticks the sharp end of the broken pool cue straight through the man’s shoulder. It comes out the other end.

Isabel puts her hands over her mouth to stifle her shocked laugh and Farlan throws up his hands, muttering about _my pool cue_. Levi jumps off the bar, decking a man in the face so hard he takes down two of his friends when he topples to the ground.

It’s less a fight that ensues in the next few seconds and more that Levi levels the crowd around him to a groaning mess on the floor before anyone really knows what hit them, moving so fast most of them don’t even have time to look surprised. Then he grabs a bottle of whiskey and heads to the doors, already wrenching them open by the time his actions register with the crowd.

The man who said something about Levi’s bike looks down at his shoulder, up at the place where Levi used to be, then back down at his shoulder. Very slowly, he turns to his equally drunk, ugly friends picking themselves up off the ground and says, “He … fuckin’ _stabbed_ me.”

Levi turns in the open door with the whiskey in one hand and the other half of the broken pool cue in the other. The jukebox track switches and 2Pac’s _Who Do You Love_ comes on. Levi grins, very much like a shark.

“Don’t say shit about my bike.”

Then he’s closing the doors and barring them with the other half of the pool cue, locking everyone inside. Through the glass he can see Farlan throw up his hands again. Isabel gets back up on the bar and starts dancing, laughing like a maniac as the crowd makes a mad rush for the barred doors.

It’s clear what Levi’s going to do before he does it, and the people closest to him – pressed up against the doors and trying to break them down – are screaming curses so viciously that they’re spraying the glass with spit. Levi shudders.

_Disgusting._

He goes to his bike and hauls it up, running his hands gently over the gas tank where there’s a dent and a deep scratch, then takes off his jacket and folds it over the seat. He rips the left sleeve off his t-shirt and stuffs it into the top half of the whiskey bottle, then rips the right sleeve off and goes to the long line of shiny, overly patriotic Harleys.

Levi finds the middle bike and opens the gas tank, shoves his right sleeve into it.

The doors shudder violently, but hold.

He looks back into the bar to make sure Isabel and Farlan are with him on the plan and sees that they’ve both disappeared during the (really pretty spectacular) distraction. Good. They should be climbing through a bathroom window any minute now.

He lights the strip of fabric sticking out of the gas tank and backs up just as Isabel and Farlan come tearing around the side of the building.

Isabel gets on her bike first, and it roars to life before she yells over it, “You’re fuckin’ insane, Big Brother.”

As if on cue, the middle bike goes up in flames and pieces of the closer bikes follow suit. Levi lights the fabric in the whiskey bottle and then throws it at the further ones on the left, closest to the bar. When they go up, Isabel whoops and Farlan starts up his bike.

Levi looks straight at Duke through the window and puts on his jacket. Duke’s face is so red he looks like he’s going to choke.

Levi goes to his bike and starts it, running his fingers almost obsessively over the dent in the gas tank and idling to watch the fire for a moment, when the doors finally crash open.

Levi turns to the crowd of stunned, furious, drunk Harley drivers and flips them off, puts down the visor on his helmet, and leaves the burning wreckage of their bikes without a backward glance.

 

\------

 

The city’s bigger than most of the places they’ve been to in the past, so there’s about eighty places that come up when he searches auto shops to get his bike fixed.

Only one of them, however, is located a block from where they live. Levi figures that’s as good a reason as any and goes the next day.

Isabel’s in the apartment doing something she calls “nesting,” which really just means she’s taking stacks of stolen cash and shoving them under various loose floorboards and then covering the floors with ugly thrift store rugs. She seems to think she’s got a flair for decorating.

Farlan had offered to come with, just to make sure the shop was “legit,” but then he’d heard about some sort of a knife throwing competition in an abandoned subway station and he’d disappeared before Levi had even had a chance to turn him down.

So Levi shows up to the shop with a considerably worse-for-wear bike, a very bruised pair of knuckles, his pocket knife and enough money to fix whatever the problem turns out to be.

The shop is small, located between a hoagie place and some sort of boxing gym that Levi makes a note to check out later. When he walks in the door a little bell chimes, but the music is up so loud there’s no way anyone hears it.

It’s expansive on the inside; mostly antique motorcycles and muscle cars in various states of disarray and one or two ugly sedans suspended a couple feet off the ground. The music – which sounds very much indeed like Johnny Cash – echoes through the space until it starts to make Levi’s head hurt.

Finally someone pokes a head out from a little office, hair in utter disarray and a pair of welding goggles strapped to their forehead. They grin at Levi so widely that they look a little deranged. Their blue jumpsuit is covered in white paint and engine grease, and there’s some grease on their nose.

“Hi.” The voice is nothing like he expects, low and excited, like they’re shaking to tell him something. Levi nods, then squints at the person’s nametag. _Hanji._

“Here for a repair?” Hanji asks. Levi sniffs and nods again, shrugging his shoulders in his jacket.

“Great. Where’s your car?”

Levi gestures out front and says, “It’s a bike. The Streetfighter out there.”

Hanji peers out the door and says, “Cool, bring her in. I’ll open the garage door for you.” Then they’re turning and disappearing through the door again.

Levi goes back out and brings his bike into the garage, turning when he hears Hanji speak again.

“See that open workstation over there on your right? Erwin’s gonna help you over there.”

Levi pulls over into the workstation, looking around while he waits. The shop is large but empty of workers, save for Hanji. Something bangs from under the car next to him – a 1970s Shelby from the look of it – and he turns his head.

“Sorry,” says a muffled voice, “I’ll be right with you.”

It takes a moment for Levi to identify that the voice is coming from under the car, where legs poke out from the undercarriage wearing a pair of boots that are almost shockingly clean for a mechanic.

“It’s fine,” Levi says shortly.

He watches the mechanic slide out from under the car and tries not to let his eyebrows climb under his hairline in surprise when the man’s body just keeps _going_ : he’s enormous, ridiculously tall, with the bottom half of his jumpsuit tied around his narrow waist and a dirty white t-shirt stretched over his chest, trying its best to end Levi’s life.

He straightens up and offers a grease-stained, calloused hand to Levi, who takes it without really thinking about it. The man’s eyes are shockingly blue.

“Erwin,” he says, grinning very slowly at Levi like he knows exactly what he’s thinking about.

“Okay,” Levi says under his breath, then shakes himself and says, “Uh, Levi. You gonna fix my bike?”

Erwin’s eyes do something that makes Levi feel very warm and he says, “I’ll do everything I can for you, Levi.”

Levi’s hand is buzzing like it’s just been dealt a mild electric shock.

“Right.”

The room is so _small,_ Levi has no idea how he ever thought this was an expansive garage. He can hardly breathe. Erwin still hasn’t let go of his hand. His tshirt is thin and loose and it hangs in a horribly flattering way. Levi can’t take his eyes off a dark stain across Erwin’s collarbone.

Erwin turns his attention to the bike abruptly, as if nothing has happened at all, turning his back to Levi and leaving him feeling strangely adrift. There’s a socket wrench in Erwin’s back pocket.

_I saw this in a porn once_ , he thinks, looking at the way the thin shirt hangs on Erwin’s ridiculous back.

“TL1000 Streetfighter,” Erwin says, running a hand over the seat in a way that really shouldn’t be so abjectly suggestive. “Custom, too. Strange choice of bike.”

Levi’s hackles are up in a second.

“You got a problem with my bike?”

“Not at all,” Erwin says, turning back to Levi and lowering his voice. Everything he says has a strange tone to it, as if he’s telling Levi a secret. His eyes linger on Levi’s shoulders, his hips, his feet.

“It’s a difficult bike to handle,” Erwin continues, turning back to the bike and putting his hands on it again. Something prickles down Levi’s spine at the sight of it. “Strange rear-”

“Rear shock design, yeah.” Levi scratches the back of his head. “I know.”

“Fast, though, this one,” Erwin murmurs, crouching and running his fingers over it lightly, almost - _teasingly_. Levi feels the back of his neck flush. He really wishes Erwin would stop. “Interesting modifications.”

He’d made them to outrun police vehicles in busy city streets, but Erwin doesn’t need to know that, so Levi simply shrugs and says, “Yeah.”

Erwin gets onto his knees in front of the bike – far too slowly, in Levi’s opinion, dear God what is _wrong_ with him, he shouldn’t be _thinking about_ – and inspects it, then tuts and says, “Your oil pump is cracked, too. And I’m going to have to replace this crankcase.”

Levi’s knuckles crack when he squeezes his fist and curses. _The whole thing?_ Erwin looks up briefly, eyes flickering over Levi’s body again before he says, “Hand me that torque wrench behind you, would you?”

Levi hesitantly turns and looks for it, then turns back to hand it over and finds Erwin very pointedly looking at his ass. He shoves the wrench into Erwin’s face and says, “How long is it gonna take?”

Erwin squints, a considering look on his face, smear of grease on his cheekbone unfairly attractive. His forearms are clearly that of a mechanic, strong with a few light, long burn marks. His hair is standing up like he’s just done a great deal of physical work.

_Or like he’s just been fuc-_

Levi shakes his head again, trying to clear it.

“Dunno,” Erwin says, then smirks at Levi as he settles onto the ground and takes the torque wrench to the bike. “You really ought to stay just in case something goes wrong.”

Levi blinks, trying to imagine a scenario in which he is misinterpreting Erwin’s meaning. Maybe the guy just has a pervy air. Maybe he’s always like this. Maybe he’s just being - thorough.

“Alright,” he says, and shrugs off his jacket. Erwin watches him, grinning with his tongue pressed up against the back of his teeth. They’re very straight, abnormally white for someone in such a profession. It’s very distracting.

“Alright,” Erwin says, then starts working on the bike.

After a few minutes of concentration, Erwin starts talking again, tone casual but – careful. Overly interested. Keen, in a way that sets Levi’s teeth on edge and makes him jumpy and sort of nervous.

“What happened to your hands?”

Levi glances down at them, then fidgets.

“You can sit, you know,” Erwin adds, nodding at a stool. Levi sits. The garage feels unusually hot. Erwin’s own hands are spectacular, fingers long and capable, nails cut short and just a little dirty. Much cleaner than most mechanics Levi’s seen.

“Bruised them,” Levi finally says, touching his knuckles before scratching the back of his neck again.

“Oh?”

Levi wants to punch Erwin in the face for his tone.

“On someone’s face?” Erwin asks.

Levi sniffs.

“Ah,” Erwin says, and his attention turns back to the bike, “perhaps the person who is responsible for the damage to this beautiful machine.”

_What the fuck kind of mechanic talks like this –_

“Had it coming,” Levi says, fidgeting. Erwin’s rolled the sleeves of his t-shirt up a few times and even _more_ of his ridiculous shoulders are visible now. Erwin starts to remove the crankcase and Levi finds himself saying, “Careful, be _careful_.”

Erwin shoots him a look. His thumb rubs over the crankcase once and Levi swallows and looks away.

“I’m very careful,” he says, voice low. He eases several parts of the engine free and places the damaged crankcase on the ground once he isolates it, along with the crankshaft and the oil pump. His hand lingers horribly in the V of the engines. “It’s all about the right pressure, you know.”

He _winks_ at Levi and Levi lifts his eyes to the ceiling for one dizzying second, trying to gather his thoughts and locate his self control.

_Christ_.

He needs a smoke. He looks around at the garage and then asks, “Can I smoke in here?”

“Of course,” Erwin says, then he stands and wipes his hands and grabs something off the table of tools.

Levi takes out a cigarette and before it even reaches his mouth Erwin’s stepping a hair too close and saying, “Need a light?”

Then he holds up the tool from the table and lights it.

A _blowtorch._

He wants to light Levi’s cigarette with a fucking handheld _blowtorch_.

Levi takes an instinctive step back and Erwin stays where he is, something unmistakably predatory in his eyes, something playful in his mouth. The blowtorch flame is the same blue as his eyes, and the heat it gives off warps the air between them. Levi feels the back of his neck sweating.

“Oh,” Erwin says, voice low enough that the rushing sound of the flame almost covers it, “Did I scare you?”

Levi grinds his teeth. His cock twitches insanely in his jeans without his consent.

_Honestly, not now_ —

He shrugs, shakes his head and puts the cigarette to his lips, then leans forward with his eyes on Erwin and puts his face devastatingly close to the heat of the blowtorch.

It’s not as hot as he expects; his eyelashes and eyebrows are in no danger and as long as Erwin doesn’t move, he’s got nothing to worry about. The split second of unconditional trust is so shocking it nearly knocks him over.

The cigarette lights and Erwin turns the thing off immediately. He doesn’t seem able to look away from Levi’s face. He lets out a long, slow breath, as if his composure has been shaken for the first time since their meeting, and licks his lips.

Levi smirks and blows smoke in his face.

Erwin takes an entire 60 seconds to watch Levi smoke, face strangely blank and mouth a little slack, before he shakes himself and smiles.

“Well,” he says softly, taking a step toward Levi. He smells absolutely nothing like a mechanic normally smells: sure, there’s hints of smoke and engine grease but mostly he smells overwhelmingly clean. Warm. Like the kind of person Levi wants to press his whole naked body up against.

“You’re not at all who I expected to meet today,” Erwin continues, and Levi hates the way it makes his chest flush. He puts his cigarette between his teeth to reach behind Erwin and pick up another wrench. He holds it out in front of him and says around his cigarette, “Get back to work.”

Erwin raises an eyebrow at him but takes the wrench and turns back to the bike.

“You know,” Erwin says from his hands and knees, digging around in Levi’s bike’s insides, “Your tattoos make you look like you’re Yakuza.”

_And you have no idea how you look on all fours like that-_

Mildly insulted, Levi leans back and says through a mouth full of smoke, “That’s what they call racial profiling.”

“I’m just saying,” Erwin continues, “You ought to be very careful in this neighborhood. It’s very well protected from uh,” he pauses. “Rival gangs.”

“Don’t say gangs,” Levi says, and kicks his feet up so he’s leaning back on the stool. “And I’m not fucking Yakuza.”

“I expected not,” Erwin murmurs, glancing back and giving Levi another overtly appreciative look.

“In any case, there’s a very powerful...” he shoots Levi an amused look, “ _club_ in this neighborhood. Be careful.”

“I can take care of myself.”

Erwin turns outright to stare at Levi’s exposed shoulders again. His gaze drops down his arms to his knuckles.

“I bet you can.”

_Am I living a porn scenario right now?_

“So the club you’re talking about,” Levi says, trying to avoid conversation where Erwin looks at him like that, “they’re the, uh, lawmakers around here?”

“Sure.”

“And the guy in charge of this club thinks he’s hot shit, huh?”

Erwin turns back to the bike, smiling so mischievously it makes a chill run down Levi’s spine.

“You could say so,” he says.

“Hm.” Levi pushes his hair out of his face. “They wouldn’t happen to frequent a certain shitty biker bar about 10 miles up the highway, would they?”

Erwin laughs. “Oh, no. Those guys mostly stick to the edge of town. Very stupid, very dangerous, but fairly small time.” He looks back at Levi’s bike, then his knuckles, then huffs softly. “You’re lucky they don’t generally carry guns,” he says.

Levi nods slowly to himself, enjoying the crackle of his cigarette when he pulls on it.

“You’re new here,” Erwin observes.

Levi nods. His cigarette is burning very slowly, smoke curling under his jaw when he scratches at the side of his neck. Erwin turns again and grins, still predatory.

“Welcome to the neighborhood.”

Levi snorts.

The back of Erwin’s neck has one long line of dark grease streaked over it and something about it makes Levi’s toes curl.

Erwin stands, wiping off his perfect hands and picking up the crankcase. “I may actually have a replacement one of these lying around.”

Levi scoffs.

“Yes, yes,” Erwin says, tone admonishing, “You have a Very Special bike with a Very Special 1998 V twin and Very Special engine design, how could I _possibly_ have the right crankcase just _lying_ around...”

Levi finds the corner of his mouth pulling up, and he shrugs.

“Yeah,” he admits.

“I might surprise you,” Erwin says softly, standing too close, and then he’s walking back toward the office.

“Might,” Levi mutters to himself, kicking off his seat and following him. He pinches out his unfinished cigarette and stows the rest of it behind his ear.

“Ah,” Erwin says, putting up a hand and coming just shy of laying it on Levi’s chest, “I think it’s best if you stay here.”

Levi furrows his eyebrows.

“Why?”

“Because the office is very small.”

“And?”

“And I don’t trust myself alone in a room with you.”

The honest certainty of the statement, the implied _I know what would happen if_ makes Levi’s head spin.

“Uh.” He has no idea how to respond to that. The air between them goes from mildly charged to absolutely unbearable in seconds.

Finally Levi settles on, “Don’t you think that’s a little ... presumptuous?”

“No.”

Well, fuck.

Levi raises his eyebrows and holds his hands up in a placating gesture. Erwin turns and walks over into the office, closing the door.

Levi stands there half-hard and confused, weighing his options.

He could sit here and wait for Erwin to come out and finish the repairs on his bike, pay him and be on his way.

Or -

Or he could go find out exactly what Erwin had meant when he said he didn’t _trust himself_ with Levi.

Levi looks over at his bike: his poor, beautiful, halfway-to-fixed bike, promises he’ll be right back, and turns for the office door.

Just once. Then he’ll never come back here again, and he can cross this off a list of absurd fantasy scenarios he never thought he’d live.

Just this once.

The second he opens the door Erwin turns from the mess of parts he’s picking through with an almost _panicked_ look on his face.

“Levi-”

Levi doesn’t let him finish. He’s backing Erwin up against the wall in half a second, one hand on his chest. When Erwin’s back hits the wall a little huff of stunned breath stutters out of his mouth and Levi looks up at him - Jesus Christ he’s fucking tall - and says, “What are you gonna do now?”

When Erwin speaks his voice is so low it vibrates straight through Levi’s chest.

“You are making this very difficult.”

One of his hands settles warm and solid against Levi’s back and pulls him so close he feels like he’s going to burst into flames.

“Yeah,” Levi says, and grabs a fistful or Erwin’s stupid t-shirt. “I do that.”

“Make things difficult?”

Levi nods.

“And to think,” Erwin says, and the hand that’s not on Levi’s back sinks into his hair and grips it hard, pulling right at the roots, “I was trying my very best to be professional.”

_Shit shit shit shit -_

Erwin’s fist tightens just a little and Levi’s lips part, it’s _good_ , the pain bright and easy and brilliant and he _should have known it was going to be like_ -

A loud, cheery voice sounds from the other side of the office door: “Hey, Erwin?”

Levi freezes. Erwin doesn’t look away from him when he responds, hand still in Levi’s hair.

“Yes?”

“I’m gonna head home.” Levi’s sure he can hear a smile in Hanji’s voice. He goes to take a step back and Erwin’s hand suddenly tightens viciously in his hair. Levi hisses in pain and Erwin says very softly, “Hush.”

Levi’s cock twitches where it’s pressed warmly against Erwin’s leg and Erwin grins when he feels it. He raises his voice and his eyes are still on Levi when he says, “Alright, Hanji. See you tomorrow.”

Levi’s heart is hammering in his chest. He’s not really sure why that is; he’s had casual sex before and it doesn’t usually leave him so - flustered. Though it might have some minor thing to do with the six-foot-something fucking Adonis currently causing him the perfect amount of pain. Maybe.

When they kiss - finally - it isn’t anything approaching tender or tentative, but there’s still a strange intensity in it that seems - wrong for the situation. Erwin tastes good, warm and _familiar_ somehow and when Levi bites his lip he makes a noise into his mouth that sends a wave of heat over Levi’s skin. His hands are bruising on Levi’s hip, cruel against his scalp. It’s perfect.

This is exactly what he had wanted, this is what he’s been looking for without realizing it for months, someone who isn’t _careful_ with him -

Erwin pulls back to bite savagely at Levi’s jaw and Levi’s knees nearly give out.

He manages to stutter out a “Wait-”

Erwin stops immediately, takes both hands off him and looks at him like a kicked puppy.

“Too much?”

Levi snorts. “Fuck, no. I just -” he cuts off and then nods out to the garage. Erwin grins so wide Levi might go so far as to call it _adorable_ if the rest of him didn’t look so ridiculously obscene.

His hair is even more of a disaster than before, his cheeks and throat flushed pink and his eyes so dark they look navy, like the bottom of the ocean. His shirt is stretched out from Levi’s fist so that his collarbones and a few inches of perfect chest are exposed, and his jumpsuit is doing absolutely nothing to hide how hard he is. He takes off before Levi can stare anymore, and Levi follows him out of the office and back to his bike -

Before his brain can process anything else, Erwin picks him up.

He picks Levi up. Just like that.

People try. They see that he’s short and they think it’ll be easy, but Levi’s nearly 99% muscle and he’s _much_ heavier than he looks, and no one like Erwin has ever done it and _dear God_ , he never knew it could be so -

Erwin sits Levi down on his bike, ass sideways in the seat, pushes his legs apart and drops to his knees.

“Wait,” Levi breathes again, and Erwin looks up at him. God, Levi is so dizzy at the sight of that he nearly falls off the bike. “Do you have -”

Erwin shakes his head and runs a hand up Levi’s thigh, unruffled.

“I’m clean-”

“Sure,” Levi scoffs, touching the smear of grease at Erwin’s cheek. Erwin rolls his eyes.

“Don’t you trust me?” He says, voice low. Levi finds, strangely, that he does. Erwin runs a finger over the teeth of Levi’s zipper but doesn’t do anything else. Levi groans.

“No.”

“Well, I suppose we could just stop-”

“You’re not fucking me without one,” Levi says. Erwin looks affronted.

“Who said anything about fucking you?”

“Well then what the fuck are we-”

Erwin squeezes Levi’s cock through his pants. “If I have to tell you to hush again,” he says, and leans forward so he’s speaking against the zipper, “I’m going to be very unhappy.”

Levi tries to roll his eyes but his entire world is focused on the muffled heat of Erwin’s mouth.

“You can’t talk to me like that,” he says, almost under his breath. Erwin laughs and reaches for his button.

“Yes, I can.”

“Bastard.”

“Masochist.”

Levi looks down sharply at him and Erwin chooses that moment to pull his pants halfway down his ass and take his cock out. He smiles and licks his lips but doesn’t touch it.

“I am _not_ a masoch-”

Erwin digs his nails hard into Levi’s hip and bites the soft skin of his thigh, so close to what Levi wants but completely different, and the pain is sharp and white and _consumingly_ hot and Levi makes a noise that he immediately regrets.   
Erwin grins up at him.

“Yes, you are.”

“Fuck you,” Levi hisses, clenching his hands into fists.

“Perhaps next time.”

And it’s been a while, a long while, and so that promise in that _voice_ goes straight through his whole body like lightning.

“I’m going to put my mouth on your cock now,” Erwin says softly, and it sounds almost like he’s amused, “So if you have objections, this is the time.”

Levi chances one glance down at Erwin and regrets it: he looks - ridiculous.

It’s late afternoon now and his hair is gold in this light, real gold like the kind people used to kill for, and there’s a devastating flush across his cheeks and the tops of his ears that Levi, in spite of himself, seems to find endearing. He’s grinning and his mouth is wet like he’s been licking at it. And the _look_ on his face is -

Like he has Levi pinned squirming under him, despite the fact that _Erwin_ is the one on his knees.

“Smug bastard,” Levi murmurs under his breath, and Erwin nods even as he presses his lips to the head of Levi’s cock.

Levi hisses, very much like the sound he made when Erwin first pulled his hair, and white-knuckles the seat of his bike like he’ll die if he lets it go. Erwin’s mouth is warm and wonderful and teasing, lips and tongue soft and perfect and never exactly where Levi wants them.

He shifts and kisses Levi’s stomach and somehow _that_ makes Levi jump, seems more intimate than kissing his dick had, and he starts to pull his knees up to guard himself.

Erwin’s perfect hands grip Levi’s hips bruisingly hard and hold him still. It hurts, and Levi’s cock twitches helplessly. Erwin hums, considering. Levi growls.

“Would you just fucking-”

Erwin laughs, then ducks his head and swallows Levi’s cock like it’s nothing, all at once and with no warning whatsoever.

It’s _so_ warm, shockingly warm and devastatingly wet and he can feel that goddamned tongue tracing little patterns on the underside of his cock and he bites his lip so hard that it bleeds trying to stay quiet.

Erwin’s hands tighten on his hips and Levi sucks in a breath, trying very hard to control himself. His heart is pounding so hard it hurts. His ears are ringing. He’s dizzy as fuck.

Very abruptly, Erwin pulls off with the filthiest sound Levi’s ever heard in his life. He wipes his mouth and then looks up at Levi’s face, expression considering again.

Levi can feel himself panting.

“Not the reaction I was hoping for,” Erwin says quietly, running a finger down the length of Levi’s cock.

“Fuckin- what?”

Erwin doesn’t say anything else, just takes Levi by the hips and jerks him off the seat of the bike and then spins him around.

“ _What_ -”

Levi doesn’t have time to register what the fuck is going on before Erwin is _slamming_ him over the bike with one hand on the small of his back. Levi flushes instantly.

“What the fuck are you-”

Being bent over his own motorcycle wasn’t exactly on his docket for the day, and no one has ever handled him quite like this, and he doesn’t -

Erwin’s mouth touches him with absolutely no warning whatsoever.

“ _Fuck_ -”

He should stop this, he really should, he doesn’t _know_ this person and this is - it’s too - this isn’t -

Jesus fucking Christ, his tongue is hot. It _hurts_ , almost. He can’t be - why is he - how -

“What - wha- what are you, fuck, what are you doing, what-”

Erwin huffs a laugh right up against his _fucking asshole_ what the _fuck_ -

“ _This_ is the reaction I was hoping for.”

He licks at Levi once, long and excruciatingly slow, and the sound Levi makes is higher and louder and more mortifying than any sound he’s ever made in his life. It echoes through the garage. He swears his bike vibrates with it.

“Perfect,” Erwin murmurs, and does it again.

“Jesus Christ.” Levi’s voice is weak, shaky, wavering like he’s being -   
Well, like he’s being broken open in the middle of some seedy garage bent over his favorite bike.

“How - why are you- this is so-”

Erwin’s tongue stops trying to destroy Levi’s life to speak.

“Dirty?”

Levi flushes red and nods. Erwin makes a noise but Levi’s ears are ringing so hard it’s very difficult to make out what it is. He distantly realizes Erwin is still talking.

“Had a feeling it wouldn’t be,” he says, soft against Levi’s skin. “Your bike is impeccably clean.”

His _bike_ -

Levi sees a flash of the way Erwin had touched it, the way his fingers had lingered in all the divots of the gears, and absurdly, feels himself whine.

“Look at you,” Erwin says, warm and quiet. His fingers are painful where they spread Levi open but he can hardly feel it. His cock aches. “Who ever would have guessed you’d be like this?” He answers his own question when he works the tip of his tongue just inside and Levi moans, broken, and goes limp where he’s bent over the bike.

No one, _no one_ , has ever reduced Levi to this.

And to think it’s some fucking scumbag nobody mechanic.

Someone is muttering curses, vicious curses, almost violently under their breath. Levi doesn’t realize it’s him until Erwin works his tongue in a little further and Levi feels the cursing stop when his breath hitches.

“If you’re wondering if I’m still going to fix your bike,” Erwin says conversationally when he finally, _finally_ stops, “The answer is yes. Obviously.”

Levi’s whole body is blushing. His cock is drooling onto the seat of his bike and his legs are shaking. The cold air on his hole where Erwin is _still spreading him open_ is somehow obscene, embarrassing, too revealing.

Something eases inside him that is decidedly not Erwin’s tongue and it takes a moment for Levi’s fuzzed-over brain to realize it’s his fingers. Two of them at once, slick with - something -

Levi jerks and turns his head but Erwin doesn’t stop, and his fingers sink in slowly and surprisingly easily as he says, tone light, “Don’t worry, I didn’t get this from the tool table.”

Levi can hardly speak.

“Wh- what-”

Erwin curls his fingers, searching, and holds his hip with his other hand when Levi jerks violently.

“The lube’s for you, not your bike.”

His fingers don’t stop but they’re slow, gentle compared to the rest of him, making no effort to spread him open beyond this. Levi is so dizzy. He can hardly breathe.

“What, you just,” Levi can’t believe how weak his voice sounds, how breathless he is, how difficult it is to speak, “Just fucking - carry _fucking shit Christ_ lube around in your - _fuck_ \- your pockets?”

Erwin laughs and doesn’t answer, and then reaches a hand around and grips Levi’s cock at the same time he hits that devastatingly perfect spot inside him. He makes a noise when he feels how Levi’s been leaking all over the seat.

“Oh,” he tuts, so infuriatingly self important for a _mechanic_ , “You’re all wet.”

That’s it, Levi’s coming just like that, body pulled tight like a wire about to snap. His voice cracks when he yells. Erwin makes a cooing sort of noise and it sends one last shock of heat through him.

“Well,” Erwin says before Levi’s even caught his breath, sounding inordinately pleased with himself, “I’ve been wanting to see that since you walked in.”

Levi’s still panting, and it’s a colossal effort to get up and fix his pants so he’s not just hanging over his bike with his ass out. There’s come all over the seat. He leans against the tank and gives it an apologetic pat.

“What,” he says, trying not to sound like he’s still winded, “You saw me walk in and thought, ‘Hey, I wonder what that guy looks like when he comes?’”

Erwin nods, shrugging. “More or less exactly that.”

Levi doesn’t know what to say to that, so he just motions to Erwin’s ridiculous boner.

“Want me to do something about that ridiculous boner?”

Erwin laughs and shakes his head.

_No?_

“I need to get to work on your parts if I want to be home at anything resembling a reasonable hour.”

“Huh.”

“Trust me, Levi,” Erwin says, all big sincere eyes and flushed cheeks and swollen mouth, “I got exactly what I wanted.”

_Well, shit._

Levi’s at a loss for words again, so he just shakes his head and raises his eyebrows and doesn’t respond. His heart is still trying to slow.

Erwin motions to the seat, still splattered with come. Levi flushes preemptively.

“You know your saddle’s loose, right? It wobbles.”

Levi nods, kicking off the bike and sliding to the ground to sit gingerly.

“I like it that way,” he says, trying not to let his breath hitch when he settles down.

Erwin turns back to the bike and starts installing new parts.

“Of course you like it that way,” he says under his breath, and Levi grins despite himself.

In the end, the bike looks arguably better than before, and Erwin tries to tell him it’s free.

“It’s not _free_ ,” Levi argues, feeling like a scumbag. Well, feeling _more_ like a scumbag than usual. “I’m not a whore and neither are you.”

Erwin raises one eyebrow. His hair is still a riot. It’s a devastatingly good look on him.

Levi pushes the cash into Erwin’s hand. “Take the goddamn money.”

Erwin pockets it with a sullen sort of look on his face, like he’s pouting. _Fine_ , the look says. He hands Levi back his keys.

Levi shrugs on his jacket and sets his helmet down before turning back to the bike.

“You did good work,” he says appreciatively, then blushes at the tone in Erwin’s voice when he responds.

“Thank you.”

Levi sits and starts his bike. Before he drops the visor on his helmet he says, “You did good work on the _bike_ , you pervert.”

Erwin’s eyes go to where Levi’s currently straddling the seat and he grins. Levi blushes again.

_Well_ , his brain supplies unhelpfully, _he did do good work on the_ -

Goddamn it.

He doesn’t even respond to Erwin’s amused little, “See you around, Levi.” He just revs the engine until he can’t hear and pulls out of the garage.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Levi gets a new job

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> woops this got ...... longer  
> hi guys its been a minute

When he gets home, the house looks considerably more put together. Isabel had actually done a good job - it looks almost like a home, and not like a safehouse that they’d moved into two days before.

“Home, Dizzy,” he calls, throwing his keys into a little bowl by the door and hanging his jacket up on a bare nail.

Isabel’s voice sounds from the kitchen, sounding weirdly distant. Levi must not be used to the house yet.

“Hey, Bro, can you come in here for a sec?”

He rounds the corner to see her sitting on the kitchen table picking her nails with a pocket knife, something she usually didn’t do unless she wanted to seem threatening. Levi’s skin prickles.

Very carefully he says, “What’s up, Diz.”

Isabel nods behind Levi and says, “This nice creepy gentleman says his name is Mike-”

Levi’s spinning around and pinning the man to the wall with a knife to his throat before the rest of his brain even registers that he’s there.

Isabel keeps talking as if Levi hasn’t moved. Levi’s knife cuts the man’s jaw just a little.

“He insisted on waiting here for you. So I figured I’d keep an eye on him.”

“Thanks, Diz,” Levi says, voice low. He doesn’t look away from the man in his kitchen.

Mike says, “Isabel here has been very accommodating.”

Levi’s stomach drops and the knife presses a little harder. A little trickle of blood runs down into Mike’s collar. Levi watches it while he says to Isabel, “You good?”

Isabel scoffs. “He didn’t touch me. I’m fine.”

Something unfolds carefully in Levi’s chest and he turns his attention back to Mike.

“What are you doing in my kitchen.”

Mike looks far too calm for a person with a knife pressed to their carotid artery.

“Looking for you, Mr. Ackerman,” he says. Then the cold metal barrel of a pistol is being pressed to Levi’s ribs. “And it seems you’ve brought a knife to a gunfight.”

Levi doesn’t move. “Wanna see who’s faster?”

Mike smiles. Levi doesn’t like it at all.

“What the _fuck_ ,” he emphasizes the word with another press of the knife and another thin trickle of blood stains Mike’s collar, “are you doing. In my house.”

“Well,” Mike says, digging his gun into Levi’s ribs until Levi hisses, “My boss asked me to see you.”

Levi doesn’t respond. Isabel is stock still on the kitchen table, eyes wide on the gun pressing into Levi’s chest.

“Do you remember robbing a bank on 17th and M in Maria City last month?” Mike asks, still too calm.

Levi pales. He’d thought they’d made it out of that one.

Mike takes his silence as a response and continues, “The funds at that bank were of particular - interest. To him.”

Levi still doesn’t respond, but Isabel says very softly, “We hit a motherfuckin’ mob boss.”

Levi shoots her the briefest of looks.

“We didn’t hit anyone,” he says to Mike. “But _if_ we did,” he glances at Isabel again, “Who exactly would be upset about it?”

Mike smiles again and cocks the gun. Isabel gasps. Levi doesn’t flinch.

“I suggest we all stop playing games, Levi.”

Levi glances at Isabel, hands steady on the knife at Mike’s throat. He winks at her. _I’m fine, see?_

It seems to work. The terrible, tense set of Isabel’s shoulders settles somewhat.

“Fine,” Levi says, making a big show of holding his free hand up. The hand on the knife, however, doesn’t move. He waits.

Mike pushes the hammer of the gun back up, nodding to himself. They both straighten at the same time, breathing sighs of relief. Mike rubs absently at the cut on his neck and Levi lets himself breathe without the feel of the pistol against his ribs.

“You know,” Mike says offhandedly, “I think my boss would like you.”

Levi raises his eyebrows.

“Despite the fact that you robbed him,” Mike adds. “Or perhaps _because_ of the fact that you robbed him. We had a lot of security at that bank, you know.”

Levi nods, making a face. There _had_ been a lot of security there. More than usual. It had made Levi curious, the prospect of having to get past it. It was the main reason they’d targeted the bank at all.

“He _would_ like me?” Levi asks. “You just said he sent you here. He knows me already.”

_And clearly doesn’t like me at all_ , Levi thinks, _If he’s sending a gun into my fucking home._

Mike shakes his head, waving his hand dismissively. He scratches at his head with the pistol, nonchalant. His demeanor has shifted completely. He seems almost...friendly. In spite of himself, Levi feels his shoulders relax. He almost _trusts_ him.

“Nah, he just told me to find the person responsible. I haven’t reported your name to him yet,” Mike answers, and then immediately pauses, as if realizing he’s made a mistake. He cocks the gun again.

“But I’m not the only one who knows who you are, either,” he adds. Levi raises his hands in a placating gesture.

“Put the gun down,” Levi says, voice tired. “I’m not gonna cut you in my own house.”

Behind him, Isabel says, “Yeah, do you know how hard it is to clean blood out of floorboards like this?”

Levi smiles.

Mike looks convinced, though unnerved, and puts the gun away again. He leans toward Levi and sniffs and Levi leans away, making a face.

“Did you just _smell_ me, you motherfucker?”

Mike shrugs. “You smell...familiar.” He scratches his head again, so that all his carefully arranged hair stands up all over the place. It ruins his intimidating air. “I was trying to place it.”

“Well don’t,” Levi says, shuddering. “It’s gross.”

Mike rolls his eyes, then rubs his hands together.

“Well, then,” he says, grinning. Levi doesn’t like it. “Ready to go?”

“Go?”

“You’re coming with me, obviously. I’d really hate to have to shoot you.”

Isabel swallows heavily, audibly, behind him and Levi grinds his teeth.

“Fine.”

“Great!” Mike gestures towards Isabel. “Get your coat, sweetie.”

Isabel and Levi both move at once: Isabel to grab the almost comically large knife she’d been hiding behind her back and Levi to press his own tight against Mike’s carotid artery again.

“She stays,” Levi growls at the same time Isabel says, “Call me ‘sweetie’ again.”

Mike raises an eyebrow at Levi. “Thought you didn’t want to dirty your floor.”

“I don’t,” Levi says, fingers shaking in rage around the knife when Mike glances at Isabel again. “But I will.”

Isabel bucks at Mike once, like a schoolyard taunt, and hops off the counter with the huge knife still in her hand.

“Touch her,” Levi says softly, all traces of humanity draining out of his voice, “And fucking die.”

Mike sighs loudly. “Fine. You and me then.”

“Fine.”

“Bro!” Isabel says from the doorway, halfway between chiding and warning.

“It’s fine, Diz.” Levi turns to look at her then briefly glances down at the floorboards, where he knows she’s hidden the rest of the money. “Just take care of dinner, yeah? Chicken’s gotta come out of the freezer.”

Isabel glances down too, understanding flashing across her face. _Move the money._ She nods. “You got it.”

Levi grins crookedly at her, then winks. He tries very hard not to let the panic show on his face. “See ya soon, Dizzy.”

Levi’s out the door with Mike before she can respond. He turns sharply to him.

“If you hurt her-”

“I’ve already been sufficiently intimidated, Mr. Ackerman,” Mike says, shaking his head. “I won’t touch her. Actually,” he adds, fiddling with his hair again, “I like her.”

“Of course you do.”

Mike shrugs. “I kinda like both of you.”

Levi gets into the backseat of a black town car that looks entirely out of place on his street. Mike gets in front.

“You sound surprised,” Levi says.

“Obviously.”

“I’m a fucking delight.”

Mike snorts.

The rest of the ride passes in silence. Levi taps his foot nervously, trying to will his heartbeat to slow. They pull up behind a row of buildings, parking in a back alley. Levi tenses, waiting for the part where the Intimidating Mob Footsoldier shoots him in the back and then drops his body into a dumpster.

Except that none of that happens. Mike opens a back door and motions inside with some big grand gesture, like he’s doing Levi some huge favor. Levi walks in and stops.

He’s inside a boxing gym.

It’s empty, closed from the looks of it, and old school as hell.

Something prickles at the back of Levi’s mind - something about the street visible out the front windows, something familiar.

He’s stopped by two bodyguard looking assholes who move as if they’re going to pat him down. He narrows his eyes at the first one, looks at his gun, and sighs heavily before putting his arms out.

They find the knife under his arm, the one at his back and the one in his pocket, plus the baton on his hip and the brass knuckles in his jacket. They don’t find the knife in his boot.

Mike looks at the pile of Levi’s confiscated weapons on the floor and whistles. Levi shrugs, stuffs his hands into his pockets and waits. He’s more on edge than he expects.

“Anybody got a cigarette?”

Mike’s already getting one out when Levi speaks, so he gets out two and hands one over. Levi nods at him.

He doesn’t know how long they stand there waiting, smoking in the empty gym. It all feels far too dramatic for Levi’s taste. The way the smoke curls in the low lights, the old-fashioned heavy bags and the worn title fight posters on the walls. It sets his teeth on edge, too much like a movie.

Finally, he hears footsteps. A lot of them.

He remembers Erwin - _God_ that had been a fantastic fuck - idly warning him of the crew who ran this neighborhood. Of how the Boss was some big shit, how Levi ought to be careful. He sets his shoulders, gets himself ready to grab for the knife at his boot if he needs to. His sense of strange familiarity, almost like deja vu, is stronger now.

The man he’s been waiting for strolls in wearing a three piece suit and smoking a cigar, of all fucking things. He looks like a parody of himself, like a mob boss from an old movie.

He also looks strikingly, dizzyingly attractive.

He also looks familiar.

Mike and Levi speak at the same time.

“Sir, we found-”

“ _Erwin_?”

Erwin blinks at Levi, blue eyes just as unnaturally keen as he’d last seen them. He looks shocked for a moment before he grins widely, like a shark.

Levi looks at set of his shoulders, the look on his face, the way everyone in the room seems to unconsciously turn to him. How could he ever have thought this man was a mechanic?

“Levi,” Erwin says, sounding surprised and pleased all at once. “You are not at all who I expected to see tonight.”

“Tell me about it. Nice suit.”

It is nice, actually. He can hardly keep his mouth from watering. Erwin glances down and then looks back up at Levi, grinning around his cigar in an infuriatingly hot, self-satisfied sort of way.

“Thank you.”

Mike’s mouth is hanging open in shock and he’s looking between Erwin and Levi like he’s watching a tennis match: back, forth, back, forth, putting it together.

Finally, he says, “You _know_ each other?”

“Not really,” Levi says, at the same time Erwin says, “Oh, yes.”

Levi frowns. Erwin looks around and seems to finally take in the half dozen armed guards around them. He waves.

“Put those away,” he says softly, and the guns disappear immediately. There’s an almost tangible air of power and command about him. Levi can feel his toes curling inside his boots.  
Erwin motions to a door up on the catwalk and says, “Let’s talk in my office.”

Levi doesn’t exactly have a choice, so he goes. He doesn’t miss the tiny gesture Erwin makes at Mike, who stands just outside the door once they go inside.

Erwin’s office is nice. A little dusty, covered in more old title fight posters, and not at all befitting a mob boss in a thousand dollar suit, but nice. There is a safe under the desk that Levi clocks immediately. Mosler, old as shit. Probably built in the 20s. In incredible condition, and very beautiful, but crackable without a drill if you knew the design flaws.

Erwin sits and motions to the chair in front of the desk. Levi stands behind it, leaning against the back. He glares at Erwin.

Erwin gives him an absolutely filthy, _starving_ look, and then says in a low, warm voice, “So _you’re_ my thief, Levi.”

He sounds so pleased it makes the hairs on the back of Levi’s neck stand up. Levi shrugs.

“I dunno what you’re talking about.”

“I’m not upset,” Erwin says, putting his cigar out in an ashtray on his desk and folding his hands. “I’m impressed.”

“Impressed.”

“Mhm.”

“That someone - not me,” he adds, and Erwin raises an eyebrow, “took all your money.”

“Well,” says Erwin, grinning in the exact same way he had earlier that day over Levi’s bike, “some of my money.”

_Some_?

It had been a lot of money. So much that Isabel was going to have a hard time moving it. Levi can’t keep the look of shock off his face. Erwin smiles at him again but doesn’t say more, so Levi walks around to the front of the chair and sits, leaning toward him.

“So you’re not going to shoot me in the head, then?”

Erwin leans forward as well, lowering his voice. “Oh, absolutely not.”

“Well, then, I’m just gonna-”

“I’d like to propose you make it up to me, though.”

Levi lets his eyes drop to Erwin’s lap, hidden under the desk, then back up to his face. Erwin laughs.

“No, not like that. I’d never use sex as leverage like that.”

“Sure you wouldn’t.”

Erwin ignores him. “I was thinking more along the lines of doing a job for me. Well. With me.”

Levi feels his eyebrows skyrocket into his hairline.

“You’re free to say no, of course,” Erwin says easily, “I’ll simply come collect the money you took from me and be out of your hair.”

Levi grimaces. He doesn’t want to lose that money. He could, and he has a strange feeling Erwin won’t hurt him, but he doesn’t _want_ to. Not to mention, he’s. Curious.

“Tell me about the job.”

Erwin sits back, smile widening a little before it disappears.

“High stakes, high reward,” he says, and Levi can’t help the thrill of anticipation that runs up his heels.

“I’m listening.”

Erwin gives him a look that says _I know_.

“The target,” Erwin says, “if you’re interested, of course-”

“You know I am, you bastard.”

“It’s a private residence.”

Levi rolls his eyes, instantly uninterested. “I’m not committing some bullshit B&E for you.”

“ _With_ me,” Erwin corrects. “This isn’t a house in the suburbs, Levi. It’s a privately owned museum.”

Levi tilts his head.

“With a brand-new ST1 security system.”

Levi feels himself flush. “Those aren’t out of testing,” he says before he can stop himself. He hates the tone of his voice: reverent, riveted.

Erwin smiles. “I know.”

“What’s in there?”

“The leverage I need to topple someone.”

Levi rolls his eyes. “You’ve already got this whole overdramatic thing going on, Erwin. I mean, Christ, this whole fuckin’ reveal thing you did - Just fucking _tell_ me what I’m stealing.”

"A ledger," Erwin says softly, "And a lot of money."

"I want half," Levi says immediately.

Erwin grins. "You can have all of it."

Levi frowns, ignoring the swooping in his stomach. _Impossible_. He narrows his eyes.

Erwin tilts his head and says, "Well. Most of it."

_"Why?"_

Erwin fixes him with a look that sears right through him. "Because I need you, Levi."

Levi swallows heavily. He does his best to look unaffected.

"I need that ledger. It's very important to me."

"What the fuck do you need me for?" Levi asks, genuinely confused. He gestures to Erwin's whole - situation. His suit, his office, the armed guards at his door.

"Frankly?" Erwin asks, posture relaxing a little. It's ... oddly alluring. Levi nods.

"This is a two-man job tops, and I don't have a safe cracker. It needs to be you and me."

Levi snorts. " _You_ don't have a safe cracker?"

"Well." Erwin leans forward on his elbows, shoulders painfully broad and distracting. "Not one as good as you."

Then without any warning whatsoever, Erwin ducks down and hurls a letter opener straight at Levi's face. Levi catches it in one hand, less than in inch from his eye. His heart skyrockets into his throat.

"And no one who can do that," Erwin says. There's something in his expression that makes Levi feel like he's taking all his clothes off.

"You just almost fucking killed me."

Erwin smiles. "Only if you'd missed it."

" _Fuck_ you I could have -"

"I knew you wouldn't."

Levi stops, just stares at Erwin for a long, long time. Erwin sits back in his chair, loosens his tie, doesn't ever look away. It makes the back of Levi's neck sweat.

"One more thing," Erwin says, eyes still never leaving Levi's.

Levi raises an eyebrow.

Erwin gestures to the safe under his desk. "Open this."

Levi gives him a look. "I'm gonna need you to back up, then."

"Oh?" Erwin's smile is too warm. "Why's that?"

"You want me to get down on my knees and crack an 80 year old Mosler between your _legs?"_

Erwin bites his lip, entirely too slow. He grins again, then pushes the chair back a few feet and gestures.

"Please."

Levi keeps his eyes on Erwin when he rounds the desk, wary. He still doesn't completely trust him, and turning his back to him makes every instinct in his body protest.

"At least move that way," Levi says, gesturing to his line of sight. "I can't focus if you're just looming behind me like that."

Erwin's eyes flicker over him again, fast and then very, _very_ slow, and Levi flushes all the way down his chest. He rubs his hands together.

Erwin's voice is impossibly low and quiet when he says, "Can I watch?"

Levi looks at him and tries to suppress the shiver that darts down his spine at the expression on his face.

"Since I've never actually seen you work," Erwin clarifies, "And I'd like to know for sure that you know what you're doing."

Levi shrugs, drops to one knee in the last sexy way he can think of. "I guess."

Erwin leans in a little closer, and he smells like cigar smoke and soap, and he's so _warm_ and it's supremely distracting.

"I have a drill, if you need -"

"I don't."

Levi runs his hands over the safe, feeling the edges for warps, dents, any imperfections he can exploit or listen for.

"How are you going to-"

"Erwin," Levi says, tone short, "If I'm going to do this ridiculous fucking _audition_ with no warning and no previous information about this goddamn safe, I'm going to need you to shut the fuck up."

Erwin huffs softly. Levi takes a deep breath and puts one hand on the door, just under the dial.

If he's clocked the safe right - and he's pretty sure he has - this model's got an inch of glass on the inside that shatters with the wrong combination and locks the whole thing, which is a pain in the ass but is also pretty easy to listen for.

Erwin settles down on the ground next to him, huge body leaned against the side of the desk. He smells so fucking good it's driving Levi insane. He can hear him breathing. He can hear him _thinking_.

"Shut up," he says, low and distracted. Erwin snorts softly, then gives him a few more inches of space. Levi leans closer to the safe door.

Okay.

Focus.

He breathes, slow and even, and feels his whole body relax. His whole awareness narrows to his fingertips, and his heartbeat in his ears.

Fuck, he loves this.

One hand lands very lightly over the combination dial, and the other stays soft on the door. He turns it carefully, slowly, every single click delicate and deliberate. Each one echoes in his ears, one fading into the next, and Levi's in a sort of trance, and its like his heartbeat's synced up to the safe, and -

_Click_.

Levi opens his eyes. He hadn't even known they were closed. He looks at the dial.

"Eight."

The voice that comes out of him when he does this is different than any other time he speaks; soft and sure and just a little breathless. Erwin swallows audibly at the sound of it.

"That's correct," Erwin whispers, barely a breath.

"These are usually a four-number combination," Levi murmurs to himself, to the safe, fingers light as he runs them over the corners again. "It could be three, if you're a '21, but I think you're a - you're a '24, aren't you?"

Erwin is silent next to him, holding his breath. Levi feels like he can hear Erwin's heartbeat.

His fingers catch on something on the top of the safe - a seal, tiny and warped, in the metal.

Levi hums. "You're a '23, you sneaky bastard."

Three number combination, then.

He turns the dial back the other way, fingers singing with adrenaline. He can feel every single hit of the tumblers against the lock, all the way up the bones of his wrist. Erwin is so quiet next to him, and he smells so _good_ , and Levi leans toward him and takes a deep, deep breath -

_Click_.

"Twelve."

Erwin starts when Levi speaks, as if he's fallen into a trance with him. He clears his throat and says, "Correct." His voice sounds - off. Unsteady.

"You okay over there, Erwin?" Levi murmurs, soft and cocky and a little giddy. His whole body is thrumming with every turn of the combination dial.

Erwin grunts, then shifts like he's trying to adjust himself.

Last one.

Levi turns the dial again, and goes excruciatingly slow this time. He can hear the tumbler inside pressing on the glass pane, he can /feel the tiny little web of cracks from the way he's touching each one to the lock.

There's a crunch, and Levi freezes.

The dial's on ten.

"Nine," Levi whispers, hands hovering over the dial. "Shit."

One single wrong _breath_ and the safe is done. Shattered. A strong wind would break the pane of glass now.

A shock of pure adrenaline shoots from the tips of Levi's fingers all the way through the soles of his feet. He's holding his breath. His hand shakes once.

Erwin says, "Nine's correct, but what are -"

" _Hush_ ," Levi hisses, and Erwin stops talking immediately. Something warm and satisfied flashed through Levi's chest at that, and he remembers - for an instant, just for one moment - Erwin saying the same to him, hand tangled viciously in his hair, whole body searing hot against him -

Levi takes a breath and turns the dial backwards, all quick, self-assured confidence that he doesn't have, because if he takes too long just the extra time might be enough to break the glass, and re-enters the combination. Eight. Twelve. Nine.

_Click_.

The door opens and Levi's whole body sags, all the breath leaving his lungs in a dizzy, relieved rush. He can feel a flush on his face. His heart won't slow down.

"Fuck," he murmurs, fingers soft again on the door when he swings it open.

In the safe is nothing. It's empty.

Levi turns to glare at Erwin, only to find him looking at him so intently it stops the breath in Levi's chest.

Erwin's blushing too, breathing just a hair too hard, and his whole body's leaned toward Levi like he can't help it.

"Empty," Levi says intelligently, pointing. Erwin's eyes flicker to Levi's hands and he blushes deep red across his nose and cheeks, holy shit that's fucking unexpected, and then he seems to shake himself out of it.

"What, you expect me to keep all my valuables in a safe when I have one of the best safe crackers in the world in my office?"

Levi scowls. He's irrationally focused on how unsteady Erwin's voice still sounds, how gravelly, how affected. He leans forward just a little, eyes falling to Erwin's mouth. Something … predatory unfolds in Levi’s chest. He suddenly wants to kiss him very badly. 

"Congratulations," Erwin's mouth says before Levi can act, lips pulling up at the corners. "You just got yourself a job."

 


End file.
